


Silver Wolf Ranch

by Areiton



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Farm/Ranch, Cowboy AU, M/M, Not Fic, Parent Chris Argent, Parent Peter Hale, Read the note, everyone deserves hugs and good things, sorta fic?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-06
Updated: 2018-09-06
Packaged: 2019-07-07 21:17:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15916425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Areiton/pseuds/Areiton
Summary: They find the ranch for sale a few months after they leave California, on one of those days where they drive with no destination in mind. Chris sees it and pulls over and as they stare at the dilapidated barn and overgrown grass, at the live oaks and beautiful sprawling house, they both know–this is what they’ve been looking for.





	Silver Wolf Ranch

**Author's Note:**

> On the drive home from Texas on Monday, I passed a ranch called Silver Wolf Ranch. This is what happened.   
> I blame at LEAST half of this (prolly 75%, if we're honest) on syriala.   
> It kinda hops all over the place, but....  
> Enjoy?

After the Wild Hunt Peter leaves Beacon Hills. He takes Chris because if anyone else deserves to get the fuck out of Beacon Hills, it’s Chris.

They don’t really talk about what they’re doing or where they’re going. Sometimes, they talk about what they wanted, before Gerard Argent and his mindless hate destroyed both their lives.

Chris laughs himself sick when Peter admits he wanted to be a cowboy, and Peter realizes its the first time he’s ever heard him laugh.

They find the ranch for sale a few months after they leave California, on one of those days where they drive with no destination in mind. Chris sees it and pulls over and as they stare at the dilapidated barn and overgrown grass, at the live oaks and beautiful sprawling house, they both know–this is what they’ve been looking for.

Neither mentions how odd it is to buy a fucking ranch together, or that this thing they’re doing has suddenly taken on a terrifying sort of permanence.

But then, they don’t talk about the way Peter scent marks Chris, either. They don’t talk about Chris slipping into Peter’s bed, when one of them have a nightmare. They don’t talk about the way arousal simmers between them, deepening as they spend more and more time together.

Chris doesn’t think they need to talk.

Peter has millions, money Stiles badgered his hacker friend into helping Peter retrieve, and he happily sinks it into the ranch, and soon horses and cows spot their green fields. Chris builds an armory in one of the barns and he occasionally will teach a hunter passing through, but always he teaches Allison’s code.

Peter can run, here, shifted, and under the bright moon and Chris’ brighter gaze. He’s happier here and he doesn’t have as many nightmares now and the day Chris hangs the sign, Silver Wolf Ranch, at the end of the drive, he knows this is home.

Stiles laughs so hard he can’t breath when he sees it. Derek rolls his eyes and says they’re the most obvious people on earth. Chris shrugs and kisses Peter’s temple and goes back to feeding the horses.

Peter, after he blinks through the shock, shoves Chris into the stall door and kisses him properly, deep and filthy, druggingly slow until Chris is hard and rolling against his thigh in the most distracting way and Stiles is complaining about exhibitionism.

They’re happy. And sometimes, the lost and traumatized supernatural will stumble up to their front door and Peter will roll his eyes before shoving them into the bunkhouse. Chris thinks its adorable, and he loves Peter for giving them a safe space.

Because that’s what it is. It’s a safe space, and they have each other, and that’s all either of them want.

 

~*~

The first time it intentionally happens, Stiles calls and is like, hey we’ve got an orphaned kitsune. And Peter kinda grumbles because he still thinks he’s fierce and scary, but Stiles ignores him–he’s married to Derek, he knows better–and a few days later, a scared little girl shows up at the ranch.

Peter spoils her rotten and it takes time, but when she eventually leaves them, a year later, she’s thriving.

And it just. Keeps. Happening.

About two years in, an alpha calls and asks if the ranch will host two packs, meeting to renew alliances. Peter has Stiles ward the place to hell and back and gets all their vulnerable guests to the north end of the property, but he agrees.

And that’s how they end up the go-to neutral ground for interpack meetings. No one, even alphas are willing to cross Peter on his own territory and Chris might be retired but he has a lot to protect these days.

 

~*~

 

Her name is Lulu. She’s a three year old born wolf with a massive head of black curls and a shy smile that they don’t see for almost six months. Her parents were killed by hunters and Chris isn’t sure who is holding who back when Peter and he first hear about it.

Later he’ll realize it’s Lulu.

Stiles and Derek bring her to them, a middle of the night drive with Derek curled in the back seat with her shaking in his arms. Peter tells them to be careful because Peter and Chris might have to stay with Lulu, but Derek and Stiles don’t.

She’s like a little ghost at first, never talking and moving silently from room to room. She stays close to Peter and Chris though–they smell like pack, maybe not her pack but pack nonetheless.

Peter holds her through her nightmares and Chris makes her chicken nuggets and kisses her skinned knee, even as it heals before her tears dry up.

And sometimes, Peter holds Chris as he cries because he loves Lulu, he does, but god he misses his baby. Peter holds him and kisses away his tears and promises that Allison wouldn’t hate him for loving another little girl.

She rides in front of Peter on his big horse, and trots behind Chris while he rounds up the sheep, and the first time they hear her giggle is when Brutus, the mutt that Chris brought home, licks her chin.

She never leaves. The first time she calls Peter ‘daddy’ he knows she never will.

They get more, and some they keep, like Lulu. Some go to family they find. A little werejaguar ends up with Stiles and Derek.

But Lulu? She was their first.

 

~*~

 

Lulu.

She’s quiet. Even when she warms up to Peter and Chris, she’s quiet. Standoff-ish with the visiting packs and other supernaturals staying on the ranch. She likes her coloring books and quiet, likes her Peter and Chris.

And she fucking ADORES Derek.

Stiles and Derek come to the ranch about three months after Lulu is first dropped off.

Up until then, she’d followed Peter and Chris almost constantly–the only time she was away was for the few hours between bedtime and her first nightmare, when one of them carried her to bed. 

But then, she’s almost throwing herself off Peter’s horse, so suddenly it actually scares him, and racing toward the driveway, shrieking. It takes him a minute, and an answering howl, to realize what she’s actually doing. 

He arrives a few steps behind her, to find his shy quiet girl firmly situated in Derek’s arms, smile a mile wide, jabbering away so fast he can barely understand. Derek’s eyes are wide and startled but softening with every word out of the girl. 

Chris promises she’ll calm down by morning and Stiles drags Peter into his soundproofed study to tell the werewolf about hunting down and killing the hunters responsible for killing Lulu’s pack. 

There is a savage sort of pleasure in knowing they’re dead. 

The problem is–it never gets better. Lulu won’t be pried away from Derek, and Peter is beyond annoyed–he isn’t jealous, and Stiles needs to stop spreading those lies–it’s just. She’s  _his_  little girl, and Derek rolls into the ranch and Lulu forgets he exists. 

(Chris drags Peter away for two nights at a nearby hotel while Stiles and Derek keep an eye on Lulu and by the second round, Peter remembers just how wonderful child-free time can be) 

It goes on for years. Lulu never really warms up to other people. Occasionally, other children who stay at the ranch before they move on. And then a little boy, a werejaguar in torn jeans, his mother’s blood still in his hair, is brought to them by an alpha in Mexico. 

He’s shaking and shifted and out of his mind with grief, and Lulu…

Lulu slips out of Chris’ grasp, and walks right up to Tomas, wraps herself around him and holds him, crooning softly until the boy stops snarling and starts sobbing. 

She keeps him in her bedroom and gives her daddies very specific orders about his food, inspecting it carefully before offering it to him. 

And she calls her uncle Derek and Stiles. 

When they arrive, it’s the first time in all the years she’s been at the ranch that Lulu didn’t greet Derek with a howl in the driveway. But when he finally enters her bedroom, and sees her curled around a tiny shifted little boy, her eyes somehow demanding and begging–he doesn’t even look back at Stiles. 

They stay six months, and when they leave, Lulu smiles from Peter’s arms and waves at Tomas in his carseat in the back. 

He’s going to be just fine. Uncle Derek will make sure of it. 

 

~*~

 

Stiles and Lulu have a rocky relationship at first.

She remembers him from the night her pack died, and he smells human, like the people who killed her mama, and she doesn’t talk about it, but Lulu remembers.

And there’s the fact that she wants Derek’s undivided attention and Stiles will drag him to bed, and she’ll have to wait for him to emerge from their room in the mornings (Papa said. He was very firm and she pouted and he said there are some things his daughter was never going to see. She didn’t know what that meant but Papa is never that firm so she reluctantly obeys). He always smells funny and has a silly smile when he comes out and Stiles smells smug and it irritates her.

So she doesn’t like Stiles. And Stiles doesn’t push because Lulu needs Derek’s presence far more than Stiles needs to mark his territory.

And then one night, when she’s seven or eight, she hears the familiar sound of the Tahoe in the driveway. She creeps downstairs because she can hear Daddy and Papa talking in the low voices they use when they don’t want to wake her up, and she smells it–blood and wolfsbane.

Stiles catches her a second before she can throw herself on top of Derek and she’s screaming but he isn’t waking up and Stiles isn’t letting her go. Peter tries to take her but Stiles shakes his head and carries her into the kitchen while Peter and Chris take Derek upstairs.

Stiles tells Lulu what happened. That Derek got caught by some bad hunters. That he’s hurt. That Stiles found him and brought him right here because Peter and Chris were the best at fixing up hurt shifters.

He’s pale and bloody and his hands are shaking.

“Help me take care of him.” Stiles says and Lulu nods.

Neither of them leave Derek for the next forty two hours, not until he wakes up, and even then–Lulu just curls up on his bed and falls asleep next to him.

She never has a problem with Stiles, after that, and when Tomas arrived two years later, they’re the only people she can think to call.

 

~*~

 

She needs Peter and Chris.

And they cannot get out of going to the Hunter Tribunal. Not if they want the ranch to remain the safe haven it’s become. Silver Wolf Ranch matters too much to blow it off and Peter refuses to let Christopher go alone.

They try to brace Lulu for the trip. They bring Derek and Stiles down to keep the ranch running and their little girl safe and hope for the best.

And the thing is–no one is worried. She’s six and well adjusted and happy and has her favoritest person in the whole world.

Peter is almost jealous, he’s so not worried.

And its fine for about five hours.

And then it goes straight to hell. Lulu goes quiet while Stiles and Derek make dinner. She retreats to her room while Derek picks out a movie, and ignores the offer for a book altogether.

By morning she’s vibrating with anxiety, and won’t let Stiles or Derek touch her. She refuses her bath and throws her food on the floor before bolting outside.

Brutus keeps pace with her as she runs but nowhere is actually consoling.

They’re scent is still there, but faded and WRONG and she wants to howl in distress.

She curls up in their bed and falls asleep, exhausted, and it almost smells right. Almost.

The next day is worse. Lulu bites Stilies and Derek scolds her and she runs out again. This time, he chases her and finds her perched on Peter’s saddle, tears in her big eyes and trailing down her round cheeks. There are dirt tracks there and he thinks again that she needs a bath.

“They’re coming back, pup,” he tells her.

“Sometimes people don’t,” she whispers and his heart actually breaks.

He lets her stay there and when he hears her howling, sad and lonely and unanswered, he might cry just a little bit.

It’s sad and Stiles doesn’t mind that he has a soft side.

Stiles leaves a laundry hamper of Peter and Chris’ shirts in her bedroom and she makes a nest of them in their bed, curling there and falling asleep.

She wakes up to a familiar scent and gentle hands turning her into a hug. She makes a broken little noise that goes straight to Peter’s gut and throws herself into his arms, sobbing as he hugs her and coos, as Chris presses up against the otherside, carding his fingers into her hair.

“Sweetheart, you had Derek,” Peter says, gently. “You adore Derek.”

She looks at them, her chin trembling, and says fiercely, “He isn’t YOU.”

Peter kinda melts at that and hugs her close, and doesn’t say a word about the dusty dirty state of his bed or his daughter.

They don’t leave her alone after that.

 

**Author's Note:**

> This will probably become a full fledged fic at some point, but for now. This is it. Feel free to tell me in comments or on Tumblr (Areiton, cuz I'm original) what you think these crazy kids should get up to.


End file.
